The Lupine Betty TL is the size of a small C-cell flashlight, but weighs less, and is brighter than any other flashlight. "Flashlight" is defined as a hand-held, battery operated light that fits in your pocket (lights that hook a car battery to a searchlight are almost as bright as this, but those don't count as flashlights).

This Betty TL is five times brighter than a car headlight, and can be hidden in one hand. It uses a 26-Watt LED head, which makes about as much light as a 250 watt incandescent light.

Unlike other lights, the Betty TL is on at full brightness the instant you hit the button. Nothing has to warm up as it does with HID or other kinds of lights.

There are two different batteries available, and three different beam spreads. Each beam spread draws the same power.

These lithium rechargeable batteries have the advantage of holding charge for many, many months if left unused. I get months of use out of each charge, and I've got the small battery. Honestly, I'm writing this review at the end of November, and I last charged my Betty TL-S back in May!

It's like having a tiny, weightless piece of superior alien technology that blasts out a beam brighter than the Sun. Shined into a shadow from two or three feet, it is as bright as direct sunlight!

It's got the same lighted power switch and programming lights as the smaller Lupine Piko TL Mini.

It's a little bigger than I'd want to carry in my pocket everywhere; for that, I prefer the Lupine Piko TL Mini.

It uses a dedicated rechargeable Lithium-Ion battery and includes a plug-in charger.

The Betty TL is a lightweight, marvelously well-made and very practical light for professionals, and priced fairly. You can buy crappy lights with exaggerated specifications that seem almost as good on paper, but they are either adolescent toys like the "Wicked Lasers" Torch that only has a few minutes of life on a charge and uses a primitive halogen bulb that makes more heat than light (a 100 W halogen bulb with 2,000 hour life really only has about half the output claimed by the Torch, hee hee), or the lights are too big and heavy to be classified as a "flashlight, " like the otherwise excellent 4-D cell Fenix TK70.

The Betty TL is the real thing, in a class by itself, and so small and lightweight that you'll actually take it out and use it. It's a fraction of the size and weight of everything else, and brighter, too. It's a tool you'll actually use — a lot.

Great also about the Betty TL is its wide beam, which is far more useful than the pencil beams of other lights.

Lumens define how much light leaves a flashlight. How far it shines also depends on how tightly this light is formed into a beam. Tighter beams shine farther, while broader beams make it easier to see what's around you. Lumens are the best measurement of total light output; while candlepower (not shown here) will vary as you focus a beam.

Here are lumen ratings of some other popular small, tough flashlights:

The only lights that might be brighter than this Betty TL use car batteries, and/or HID bulbs that take time to warm up. Who wants to wait for their flashlight to warm up? HID car-battery lights aren't that much brighter, either. Fenix makes a TK70 with 2,200 lumens, but it's not a flashlight; it's 16 inches long and runs on four D cells, with only the same battery life!

It's easy to use: press the button for ON, press again to dim, and hold for a second to turn off. You can change this.

Compared to a car headlight, it puts out five times more lumens, however, the car headlight spreads more horizontally and less vertically. The car headlight usually has a hotter hotspot in the middle, while the Betty TL has a broader bright section of the beam.

Brightness

Better than just having a spot pencil beam like so many "bright" flashlights like the Fenix LD41, the broad 26º beam lights up everything, not just whatever's straight ahead. There is so much extra brightness that it's much better to get the broadest-beam option as I did.

It's so bright that its range isn't limited by its own brightness; it's limited by how clear is your air! Dust and humidity kicks-back light scatter that obscures your vision.

I was able to illuminate objects 1,000 feet (300 meters) away with the light in my hand, but farther than that, the light kicked-back from the dust in the air obscured my view. It's exactly like the cone of light we see coming from a slide projector on its way to the screen in the dark; a load of light is coming out the front of this. The farther away you can get it from your eyes, the farther you'll see in the dark.

So much light comes out the front that there is a little recoil. For bicycle competition, you might want to dim it a bit, or shine backwards through a mirror if the sanctioning body permits that (you'll get a little free "push"). Don't leave it on a table on BRIGHT, because it might shoot itself off the side!

It does not flicker when dimmed, as do most lesser lights.

Heat

It gets hot if left on for a while at full brightness. This is normal; it's dissipating 26 watts of power. The beam of light isn't that hot (it's cool light), but the case heats up.

Light Distribution (Beam Spread)

It has a smooth beam with a smooth, even center circle around which the light gets dimmer.

This beam pattern is great for all general use, as well as for off-road riding.

For road riding, you'd want a beam more like an automotive headlight: wider horizontally, and brighter at the top than the bottom.

There is a little afterglow. If you look into the light after you turn it off, it glows for a bit after you've been running the light.

Charge Life

Used intermittently on a daily basis, I've been going a few months and the battery meter still says I'm at 90% charge!

Death Ray

I'm amused at how some people who sit at desks all day think that blinking flashlight beams can disorient, disable or kill a man. Even funnier is how these folks think that rapidly blinking lights are some sort of PSYOP secret, and speak of this feature in only the softest of voices among members of their inner circles so that these secret weapons they carry (their flashlights) don't start getting regulated and registered, just like firearms.

Taking one for the team, I tried staring at the "disorientation flash," both at the beam as shined on a wall, and then when that didn't kill me, I stared right into the beam.

I lived long enough to write this.

In fact, the blinking modes are dimmer than the BRIGHT mode simply because they flash on and off, instead of staying on steadily. Big deal.

Criminy, if I need a flashlight for self-defense, it's my 6-D cell Maglite, not a blinking flashlight. If you need protection against wild animals in the woods, bring your bear rifle. Back when I had a pacifist for a girlfriend, even she warned me to bring a BIG gun in case of rowdy bears while hiking in the back woods of Alaska. All that shining a blinking light into an enemy's face will do is remind him to take your fancy flashlight after he kills you.

Yes, rapid blinking annoys, but it doesn't disorient or harm unless someone's got epilepsy. I haven't tried it on trail animals or skunks.

To get charge percentage, divide how many Ah you've used by the battery's rated capacity. The TL-S has 2.5 Ah, and the larger TL battery have 5 Ah.

So, if four red blinks is 0.4 Ah and you have a TL-S holding 2.5 Ah, you've used (0.4/2.5), or 16% of your capacity, so you ought to have 83% charge left.

Hey, not bad for having only one control and two LEDs as read outs.

Programming

It's perfect as-shipped. Don't waste your time with this, but if you want to change things, the manual isn't very helpful.

I couldn't figure it out, but my 5-year-old did. To program it, with power OFF, hold the button until the red or blue LEDs blink. Hold the button until a certain number of red or blue blinks happen, and let go. What each of these settings do is laser-engraved on the side:

Lupine Betty TL-S Programming reference.

You hold it and see the red blinks to set what sort of light options it makes, and hold it longer to get to the blue blinks to set overall response to button clicks.

If you want it to turn on with two clicks for safety in a pocket, or to start dim, you can program that, too.

I prefer the broadest 26º option; it's more than bright enough for anything, and the wider beam lets us see so much more in the dark.

Likewise, the small TL-S battery has lasted me for months of use, and I've still got 90% of charge left. I'd only get the long TL version if you wanted a longer handle to hold, or if you're making a long bike commute every night.

Personally I don't need this much light, so I find the Lupine Piko TL Mini more than bright enough, and it fits in my pocket.

The front of this Betty is too big for comfortable carrying in my shorts every day, but as a light to pop in a bag or mount on a bicycle, it's crazy.

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